


bad odds

by soulofme



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: M/M, One-Sided Keith/Shiro (Voltron), Pining Keith (Voltron), Post Season 8, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, angst of course, i said i was gonna pretend s8 didn't happen but here we are
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-16
Updated: 2018-12-16
Packaged: 2019-09-20 00:14:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17011842
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/soulofme/pseuds/soulofme
Summary: “You could’ve married me instead.”The words hang between them for a few long moments. Keith’s expression doesn’t change, stays as blank as it’d been since they left the reception. James wonders if he even heard him.“That never would’ve happened.”





	bad odds

Keith comes to him when everyone else on this good green Earth is asleep, when it’s just James and the moon, James bitching to it and it absorbing every goddamn word.

He gives himself to James but he’s not stupid enough to think it means something. James leaves as many marks as he can, tells himself to make _it hurt_ , just so Keith’s forced to think of him, long after he’s gone. And even when he’s here, close enough to hear his breaths, close enough to hear his heart beating right out of his chest, he’s so, so _far_.

It starts the day Takashi Shirogane gets married. The wedding’s beautiful, in every way. It’s practically out of a Hallmark cliché, all bright lights and flowers and _happiness_.

But Keith’s the dark cloud hanging over the whole thing. He smiles when it’s appropriate, laughs when he has to, gives a killer best man’s speech that has Shiro grinning, arm wrapped around his husband. Whatever the hell his name is.

Later, after, James sticks around. Hears how Shiro grabs Keith close, pats him on the back, thanks him for being his brother, his _family_ , and he sees the exact moment Keith’s heart shatters into a hundred and one pieces.

He waits until everything is settled down, until Keith’s pasted himself against the wall while everyone else enjoys the reception.

James says, “Nice wedding, huh?”

Keith doesn’t startle, doesn’t jump. Lifts his glass to his lips and takes a long, prolonged sip.

“Sure. It’s great.”

James snorts.

“Say it like you mean it.”

He thinks Keith’s eyes flash Galra-gold for a second, but maybe that’s his brain playing tricks on him. He doesn’t imagine the snarl on Keith’s face, though, the downright nasty expression that makes it obvious he won’t hesitate to rip James a new one if he doesn’t shut the hell up.

Too bad James was never good at taking cues.

“Why are you here?”

“Let’s go,” James says, jerking his chin towards the parking lot. Everything’s winding down. No one’ll miss them.

Keith doesn’t put up a fight. He slams his glass onto the nearest table and follows James out of the reception, out of the big fancy building that probably had cost a fortune to rent out.

They get to his car and Keith drops into the passenger seat without any prompting. James bites back a smirk and gets in, buckles himself up but doesn’t put the car into gear. He tousles his pomade-slicked hair and chances a look at Keith from the corner of his eye.

“You wish it was you instead?” he asks, just to see how much it’ll hurt.

Keith doesn’t say a goddamn word, lips pressed into a firm line. He rests his arm against the window and presses his cheek to his fists, his eyes slipping shut.

“I don’t wish for anything,” Keith answers after a moment, and James can hear the silent _anymore_ tacked onto the end.

It makes this feeling swell inside him, something that feels like an elephant sitting right on his chest, suffocating him. He cracks a window and digs a pack of cigarettes out from the dashboard, leaning over Keith as he does. Keith doesn’t react, physically, but he does open his mouth after getting this disgusted look on his face.

He says, “You still smoke that shit?”

“This?” James asks, shaking the box. “This was good, back in the day.”

“Back in the day,” Keith echoes, snorting derisively. “We’re not that fuckin’ old.”

“We’ve seen some shit,” James murmurs, plucking one out and lighting the end. He offers it to Keith, ignoring how Keith rolls his eyes at him and glares out of the window. “I deserve this, Kogane.”

“Thought you quit.”

“I did. For a while.”

“Fell off the wagon?”

“We all have our addictions,” James says, inhaling deep and letting the smoke settle right down in his lungs, imagines them shriveling up and turning black with each heavy huff. “Some are worse than others.”

“Jesus,” Keith swears, twisting to face him, the leather seat crinkling beneath him as he does. “What the hell are you on about?”

James jerks his chin towards the building.

“Why’d you come?”

“I was invited. Same as you.”

“No, not the same,” James says, exhaling smoke at Keith’s face just to see him growl in irritation. “I haven’t been eye-fucking the groom for the past decade. Well, _one_ of them.”

“Shut up,” Keith snarls.

“We’re pushing thirty, man. Thought you would’ve given up on him by now.”

“Shut the fuck _up_ ,” Keith shoves him then, and it’s like they’re kids all over again, bursting with rage and hormones and who knows what.

James wants to laugh, almost, because there’s something so achingly familiar about it. He can close his eyes right now and think about being back at the Garrison, about sneaking up onto the roof and chain-smoking until his eyes burned, about staying up late just to see how long he could make it, about having Keith fucking Kogane on his knees for him.

It only happened a few times, the times where they’d both been wasted on whatever they could get their hands on that week. The last time was sometime after Shiro got blasted into space to Kerberos, and Keith didn’t know how to handle his crush in a way that didn’t send him barreling down a path of self-destruction.

Enter James.

Not the most brilliant of choices, of course. There was never any love between them, and neither of them was searching for that in the other. But it was something to do, something to help Keith forget, and in the end the reason for it never seemed to matter much.

He doesn’t know what has him pulling out of the parking lot and driving, driving until he reaches the shitty motel he’d been forced to crash at last minute. James hadn’t intended on going to the wedding, not really. He appreciated Shiro, and respected him of course, but it wasn’t like they stayed close after Shiro removed himself from anything remotely _space-like_.

But then Nadia said she was going, then Ina, and even fucking _Ryan_. So, no, James didn’t have a choice. He bought a cheap suit that crinkled like tissue paper the second he put it on and rented a room in a shady as shit motel so he wouldn’t have to drive the two hours back home drunk off the scotch he’d been nursing at the reception.

He doesn’t know why he’s bringing Keith along for the ride, though. Figures it doesn’t matter, because when he gets out of the car Keith follows like a goddamn lost puppy.

They get inside and James loosens the knot of his tie. He jerks his chin towards the fridge, the one he’d stocked with beer and Chinese food the night before.

“Want a drink?”

Keith doesn’t answer.

He’s standing against the wall, arms crossed over his chest. He looks eighteen all over again. It shouldn’t make heat swell in the pit of James’s stomach, or make him think about how he’d seen how red Keith’s lips can get. They’re red now because he keeps tearing at them with his teeth. He stops when he catches James’s gaze.

He doesn’t know why, but he says:

“You could’ve married me instead.”

The words hang between them for a few long moments. Keith’s expression doesn’t change, stays as blank as it’d been since they left the reception. James wonders if he even heard him.

But then, Keith shifts. Even from across the room, in the ugly yellow light of the lamp perched on the nightstand, James can see his jaw tighten.

“That never would’ve happened.”

“It could’ve. If things were different.”

“There’s no point talking about it,” Keith says, and James realizes faintly that he’s not _denying_ it.

He doesn’t know what to make of that. He finally wrestles his tie off and discards it onto the bed before he sinks into the armchair settled next to the television. He flicks it on, not bothering to ask Keith if he has any preference before he settles onto one of the motel’s three channels. This one’s showing westerns, the old black-and-white classics that James has seen only a hundred times.

“Maybe we just had bad odds,” James continues after a moment. He keeps his eyes on the screen, not sure if he should try and look at Keith now. “I always thought the universe had it out for me.”

“Yeah?” Keith sounds faintly amused.

“Oh, yeah,” James says, not bothering to hide his grin. “Nearly dying will do that to you.”

“Guess so,” Keith murmurs, subdued. A whole two minutes pass before he says, “Did you mean it?”

James wants to play dumb, pretend that he doesn’t know exactly what Keith’s getting at, but he _can’t_.

“I don’t know.” He wets his dry lips and continues, still keeping up the pretense of watching his movie. “If you’d stuck around, maybe.”

“You didn’t want me.”

“I wanted you,” James says, finally turning to face him. Keith’s still glued to the wall.

Keith scowls. “Why’d you bring me here?”

“Why’d you come with me?”

Keith’s whole demeanor changes then. His arms uncross, his jaw goes slack, his eyes all wide and big. James rakes his fingers through his hair, shaking his head.

“Forget it. I’m drunk. Don’t know what I’m saying and all that.”

“Stop bullshitting.”

James grits his teeth together.

“I said _forget it_ , Kogane.”

“You still want me.”

James glares at him, nails digging into the arm rest of the chair. Keith doesn’t look smug, not like James halfway expects him to. He does look pissed, though, and James has seen that expression on his face so many times that it doesn’t scare him nearly as much as it should. He’s sure a weaker man would be shitting his pants, probably babbling his way into an apology.

“The fuck does it matter?” James says, avoiding directly answering the question for as long as he can.

“You _want_ me.”

And then, suddenly, he can’t take it anymore. He stands up, storms over to Keith and grabs his shoulders just so he can throw him back. Keith doesn’t fight, lets James pin him there even when he glowers at him like he wants to pulverize him.

Keith doesn’t punch him, shove him off, curse him out. He kisses him, hard enough to hurt, to make him bleed, and suddenly they’ve reached the point of no return.

James doesn’t remember it. Not in its entirety. Just remembers the sting of Keith’s nails, his teeth, the way he moans and growls and _screams_. Remembers the taste of him, the warmth of his body, and, more than anything, how he wakes up alone.

He doesn’t stay alone for long. Keith comes back. Over and over again, whenever he feels particularly sorry for himself, and James gives into him. Each and every time.

And maybe he should put his foot down, say something like they’re not teenagers anymore, that they know more than anything that people can and always will _get hurt_ , especially in situations like these.

But he doesn’t. Because James isn’t an upstanding guy, by any means. He thinks, more often than he’d like to admit, that Takashi Shirogane would never take advantage of Keith like this.

Maybe that’s why Keith’ll always like him, _love_ him, more than he’ll ever give a damn about James.

Hell, maybe it’s why Keith secretly hates Shiro. Because he never tried with them, never realized that Keith had been doing every goddamn thing in his power to stop himself from falling more and more for him.

So, no, James doesn’t stop this. He tells himself that Keith’ll tire himself out, just like when they were kids, and he’ll go off and forget all about James. _Again_.

There’s a part of him though, a part that’s growing horrifically larger, that hopes that maybe, just maybe, Keith’ll change. Like the odds will be in his favor this time.

And isn’t _that_ a thought.


End file.
